Princes Street

Thank you to Frank Ferri for allowing me to reproduce this photo that he took in Princes Street in 1960 with his new 35mm camera.

Acknowledgement:  Frank Ferri, Newhaven, Edinburgh:  August 10, 2012

1960 Photo

I find it interesting to compare this scene with Princes Street today, 52 years later.

Similar to Today

The buildings in the background:

-  The National Monument and Nelson Monument on Calton Hill

-  The North British (now Balmoral) Hotel at the East |End of Princes Street

-  The Scott Monument at Waverley, on Princes Street

look very  similar today.  The hotel looks much fresher now, its stonework having been cleaned.

Different from today

However, in the 1960s photo:

-  Car parking was allowed on both sides of Princes Street.

-  The Castle Street junction was patrolled by Police Point Duty, rather than traffic lights.  Is that a Sunbeam Talbot turning the corner?

-  The bus approaching is one of a large batch of Leylands that replaced the trams four years earlier.

-  The shop on the extreme left, at the corner of Princes Street and Castle Street, with what appears to be a 'Royal Appointment' crest above its window is Melrose's Ltd, tea and coffee merchants. 

-   Immediately above Melrose's Ltd is Palace Hotel.  This whole block was destroyed by fire in 1991, and has since been rebuilt.

-  The small lamp posts in Princes Street Gardens, on the right-hand side of this photo are still in place today, but they are now partially hidden by the trees that have grown around them.

- The fashions of the pedestrians walking along the south side of Princes Street now look rather dated.

Leith Pubs - most long since gone

Leith - Pictures